But is the percentage of older workers accurate or is it low? Does that number count self-employment, cash or under-the-table payments for older home care aides? Housecleaning? Is that averaged across all regions, including those with significant worker shortages? What about the high percentage who receive social security payments and work -- with earnings limited to $17K annually for those under 65? Older adults surely read projections that indicate the sharp contraction in income at age 75? They must know that 61% of Social Security beneficiaries receive at least half of their income from Social Security? In short, perhaps the 65+ population asks themselves, why not work? And what is 'retirement’ in a society where fewer have -- or will have -- pensions?

Older adults will adapt to work-mandated technologies. For the older population, today's world involves finding a job, interacting with other workers, applying for benefits, learning how to be caregivers of ever-older parents, being a slice of the sandwich generation, living and finding housing for as many as four generations. The older among them may resist optional technology like smartphones – it is amazing how many clamshell phones are out there when you start looking for them. Tablets no doubt are more pleasant experiences than squinting at miniature quasi-keyboards.

Technology vendors should be kinder to – even aware of -- older adults. Time to make technology easier to use and adopt a motto -- truly design for all. Time to test the products with a sample of older adults – not just those 29-year-old team members that all think and look the same. Tune up natural language spoken interfaces. Wake up to the possibility of hearing and vision limitations. Work on the definition of what it means for an app to be intuitive. Recognize that there is a shortage of workers across multiple industries and locations. Know that older adults, knowledge, service, and manufacturing workers – are needed and, ahem, valued. Think outside the box of your cafeteria. Imagine how your robot prototypes could provide near-term assistance to caregivers, many of whom are also older adults. Now is a good time to sort through population demographics and make products that everyone can use.